Reading back over the in-game books from previous Elder Scrolls games there are a few obvious volumes which refer to places in Skyrim. The most obvious being those on Potema, The Wolf Queen of Solitude.

But perhaps one of the largest multi book stories is that of Barenziah, Dark Elf Queen of Wayrest and Queen Mother of Morrowind.

Through The Biography of Queen Barenziah, and the multi-volume The Real Barenziah, we learn that Barenziah was fostered out to Skyrim as a child, until a time Tiber Septim believed it was safe for her to be returned to Morrowind.

She stayed in a place called 'Darkmoor,' with a Count Sven Advensen, his Wife and Children. It's described as being in central Skyrim, with Whiterun as the nearest City. But in The Real Barenziah it is described as having had a 'Castle Darkmoor' with sub-basemants. So it must have been in some way noticable on the landscape.

Obviously, though, there is NO Darkmoor in TES V: Skyrim.

A fair amount of time has passed since that era, but you would expect a township large enough to have had a castle might still have some kind of physical husk on the landscape, at least hinting at its past. But where do you reckon it logically could have been?

Mind you... In the same volumes Whiterun and Rifton are described as considerably more HUGE than their in-game counterparts. It certainly suggests the at both have more than one Inn, for one. Whiterun also large enough to have 'quarters' of the City, rather than three districts.

But still, is there any area of the map which you can think of which COULD have been Darkmoor.

Possibly the vicinity of Fort Greymoor. That's around where the old maps place it geographically anyway.

Ah, so there are old maps, then?

Plenty.

The http://www.imperial-library.info/content/cartography is a nice place to start looking. They've got old (and current) in-game (= official) maps, they've got concept-art maps, and they've got maps which were made by TES fans in accordance with the lore in particular era's.

I wish for a DLC wich make skyrim more Lore friendly and add those places:)

Just look at Winterhold. The Great Collapse only happened, what, 80 years ago? If it wasn't for the college, it wouldn't look like it was ever more than a few run-down shacks.

The lore versions of cities are always bigger than you see in game, because the game is a small fraction of the "real" world scale. It applies to some buildings like the College of Winterhold, too... it should be much bigger than what you see in game.

Also, funny enough I heard a town guard in Riften comment on the Riften/Rifton thing.

Riverwood is pretty central and there is a dark elf i belive named sven. saw him chopping wood?

Sven is a Nord bard. The elf you saw is Faendal and he's a Bosmer, not a Dunmer. Don't know what that has to do with Darkmoor, though...

yea srry my bad. The guy up top said she was with a guy named count sven something. and I thought "Hey Sven" thats all.

Cheers for the link. Haven't found anything with a solid answer, sadly. The original Arena map is up there. Sadly not with any key to which township is which.




Me too. It would be kinda cool to add some kinda quest relating to Darkmoor. Odds on, if there was a castle, there are catacombs below the surface of Skyrim even if the castle itself is long gone. Mod potential there, if not.

We got two quests out of the Queen Potema/Pelagius area of Lore in Solitude.




The wonderful thing about The Great Collapse is it also forms a great excuse. You see whats left of Winterhold afterwards, with no means of comparison. It'd be perfectly easy for Bethesda to claim it was the size of Whiterun before, but spread out along the coast. And who can truly argue that it wasn't.




It really should, yes.




Really?? Awesome. Will have to keep an ear out next time I'm in Riften.

The Tamriel maps section there has maps which pinpoint and name Darkmoor. The Arena map doesn't name it on map, even though the marker is there.

Ah, right...

Interesting. The TESA: Redguard Map lists an area caled 'Blackmoor' in Skyrim - which may be intended to be the same area. It's in ths shadow of High Hrothgar. Of course Whiterun is in a slightly different place there...

[img]http://www.imperial-library.info/sites/default/files/gallery_files/WestCentralTamriel3.jpg[/img]


as to why they changed the name? Who can say. It might be that Marvel Comics has actually owned a trademark on 'Darkmoor' since the 1970s. It's the fictional place in Marvel's Britain, where Captain Britain's stories started.

Looking at that map, though... quite a few things have changed since that map.

'Haafingar' instead of Solitude.

'Markarth Side' is referred to, but the nearest City is a place named 'Snowhawk'.

And Falkreath is spelled with a 'C'...

Beyond that, there are a LOT of places on that nmap which aren't in-game in Skyrim.

It's hard to pick them all out, because the map isn't that hi-res from that image, but as well as 'Blackmoor' I can spot:

Stonebirth
Helarchen Creek
Amol
Dunstad Grove
Dunfar Wall
Laimalten
Laintar Dale
Granitehall
Nimalten City
North Kay
Neugrad watch
Oakwood
Sungard
Greenwall

And on the border with Morrowind:

Dragon Wood
Vernith Wood
Reich Caringate?

It's quite possible that a few of those ARE in-game, and I've just not visited them. But it's quite a number not to have included.

So... A bit of digging and I find that in the Biography of Barenziah from Daggerfall the township is called 'Blackmoor'.

In Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim all references of 'Blackmoor' have been replaced as 'Darkmoor'.

Interestingly, according to UESP, there is a 'Fort Blackmoor Prison Key' to be found in-game.

But there is no actual Fort Blackmoor in the game itself.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Fort_Blackmoor_Prison_Key#Fort_Blackmoor_Prison_Key

As for other Skyrim locations from that map...

Well, Solitude is the Capitol of Haafingar, that goes without saying. But the others.

Snowhawk: Snowhawk was a city from TES I: Arena. It is roughly in the same location as Markarth in the Game. However, Snowhawk does appear to have existed in game as late as Oblivion. In the Whispers of Death section of Oblivion's Dark Brotherhood questline you have to relay messages from a whispering statue in Bravil, once a week, back to the heads of the DB. The messages detail people who have performed thar Dark Brotherhood ritual, and requested a target.

One of these messages refers to a target in a small settlement just outside Snowhawk, in the Nord homeland of Skyrim. http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Whispers_of_Death

So some time in the past 200 years the whole City just... vanished? Or did it become Markarth? What's the deal there?

They renamed the city because Snowhawk refered to a Forsworn god... About 200 years ago, during Ocata his reign he declared that the Forsworn could no longer openly worship their gods, which started the real hatred between the forsworn and the Nords of today...

As a result of this declaration the city of Snowhawk was renamed to Markarth, which is just an ancient Nordic way of saying White-Hawk, which is the Nordic name for the Snowhawk bird (not to be confused with the Snowhawk god, which the Nords refer to as Kyne (or Kynareth).

Of course, all of this is completely bs but it's the best I could come up with.

Amol: Fort Amol appears in a number of in-game books. And does exist in-game as a Stormcloak stronghold. I don'tthink there's much doubt there.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Fort_Amol



Dunstad Grove: Again, there is Fort Dunstad in game. Roughly the same position, too.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Fort_Dunstad


Neugrad Watch: Almost certainly Fort Neugrad. The fort south of Helgen.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Fort_Neugrad



Sungard: Fort Sungrad...

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Fort_Sungard


And

Greenwall: Fort Greenwall...

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Fort_Greenwall

Could be as good as any, I suppose.

It just seems odd that a City from a previous game has just disappeared. A very OLD game now, but the very first TES game.

Debunked.

My travels this Evening found a Fort Snowhawk up by Morthal:

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Fort_Snowhawk

No idea if it actually bears any resemblance to its TES I counterpart, mind.

Many of the books describe events several hundred years before the current timeline, so places like that castle might no be ruins since given some other name.

The Beggar-Thief-Warrior-King series also describes a jarldom which no longer exists and several unknown villages. But Beth still included one obscure thing mentioned in those books: Jazabay Graqes.

I think it just comes down to a country with a 3000 year old history with ruins upon ruins, and many vanished villages, towns, jarldoms and the like.

Interesting...

Any idea where that Jarldom was?

There has been a Great War occur, maybe some places were completely wiped off the map. May their residents rest in peace.

Quite possible, obviously. Although in the case of a place which was large enough to have a Castle with a Keep you'd expect there to be some kind of ruins. Even from the time of Tiber Septim.

That was 600+ years ago, there is a relatively large chance that the castles names have been forgotten or changed in the telling of the story. Darkmoor could be Greymoor for all we know, difficult to say. Older things are lucky to even still exist.